Despite last-minute legal maneuvering, a federal judge has ordered trial to begin as scheduled Monday in a major copyright dispute between two of the world’s largest commercial software makers, Oracle and SAP.

While denying requests for a gag order and a three-day postponement, U.S. District Judge Phyllis Hamilton agreed to narrow the focus of the trial, in keeping with a last-minute concession by SAP that it “materially contributed” to repeated misuse of Oracle’s copyrighted software by an SAP subsidiary called TomorrowNow.

But her decision, made public Friday, did not go as far as SAP asked. The German software company had argued that its concession eliminates the need for testimony about SAP’s role in the violations. The judge, however, said Oracle’s attorneys may still introduce evidence on that subject if it provides context or relates to the issue of how much in damages SAP should pay.

Oracle is seeking more than $2 billion in damages for copyright infringement and other violations, while SAP contends it should pay an amount in the “tens of millions.”

It was unclear whether Oracle still plans to call former SAP chief Léo Apotheker, recently named CEO of Hewlett-Packard, to testify in the trial. Although Oracle placed Apotheker’s name on a list of prospective witnesses, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has suggested HP might try to keep Apotheker out of the country so he wouldn’t have to testify.

Apotheker, who has been living in France, is scheduled to start work for HP on Monday, but HP has declined to say if he will be at the company’s headquarters in Palo Alto or one of its other offices around the world. An Oracle spokeswoman declined to comment Friday.

SAP had previously acknowledged that TomorrowNow workers downloaded Oracle software and support materials and used them without authorization. Until this week, however, SAP had denied Oracle’s allegations that executives of the parent company knew about those violations and allowed them to continue.

But after Ellison vowed to prove that Apotheker and other top SAP executives sanctioned those acts, SAP said Thursday that it would admit to “contributory infringement” and asked the judge to exclude that issue from the trial.

SAP had also asked the judge to ban attorneys from making public statements outside court. Oracle, meanwhile, requested a three-day delay in the trial to revise its case in light of SAP’s concession.

After a telephone conference late Thursday, the judge declined to approve a gag order or postponement. She split the difference on SAP’s request to narrow the trial, which had been scheduled so each side would have 36 hours before the jury. SAP asked her to reduce that to 20 hours for each side, but she said each will get 30 hours.

SAP, which has complained that Ellison was creating a public relations “sideshow” by drawing Apotheker into the case, said in a statement Friday that the ruling would help “keep the trial focused on the core issues.”